Bankers Trust Co.

List of Deals

Bankers Trust Company was founded in 1903 by a group of bankers led by Henry Davison to handle trust business for commercial banks. The trust began building a network of correspondent banks in other countries to handle international trust business.

The company continued to expand, both abroad and at home. In 1917 it joined the Federal Reserve System and offered a variety of banking services, including underwriting and securities. In the late 1920s, the bank was one of the first to serve corporations as trustee of pension funds, profit-sharing funds, and other types of employee benefit plans; the bank is widely recognized as a leader in this field. The company discontinued its underwriting services after the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act.

Bankers Trust Company began retail banking after World War II. The company expanded greatly over the 1960s and 1970s; it operated in over thirty countries and had a network of correspondent banks that numbered more than 1,200. Bankers Trust New York Corporation was incorporated in 1965 to become a registered bank holding company, and in 1966 Bankers Trust New York acquired all of the outstanding capital stock of the bank. On the basis of deposits at December 31, 1970, the bank was the sixth largest in New York City and the seventh largest in the United States.

The company, among other money-center banks, felt pressure from strong loan demand in 1974, despite the economic recession. At that time, businesses required increased working capital to meet the demands of inflation, and many businesses were unable or unwilling to borrow in the commercial paper and capital markets and thus drew upon their bank lines of credit.